Multicultural?
I’ve got an email about a week ago (shame on me: didn’t answer yet). It was a very nice mail, but there was a line that struck me:
I followed [... a] link back to your blog, and I want to applaud your efforts to make multi-culturalism a reality in Canada; I wish we were one-tenth as close in the US.
Since I live in Canada I know very well that it’s mainly lip service and money spent on phantom projects rather than reality. Looking south from here it always seemed to me that in certain areas - like health care and interpreters’ training, to mention just the two where my partner and I have wested interest - US is way ahead compared to Canada. I mean when it comes to implementing multiculturalism. Though, perhaps, they talk less about it. (Which reminds me of a former boss of mine when I was working with a Canadian NGO very much involved in multicultural issues, and one day he told me: It is not enough to do a good job, you have talk a lot about it to let people know… I have the impression usually only the second half of this statement is true. The lot of of talk.) Anyway, I was postponing and postponing my reply to the above email because I wasn’t sure what to say. I was sure he is not right, but how can I prove it?
Today my the local newspaper (Winnipeg Free Press) carried an editorial, which I cannot link, it’s only for subscribers, where they referred to a recent poll by Ipsos-Reid saying:
The poll offers two differing conclusions. The first is that the two nations are growing more distant. In the last three years the percentage of Canadians who think of the U.S. as their closest ally has dropped from 60 to 53; the percentage of Americans who think Canada is No. 1 went from 18 to 14.
On the brighter side, the poll indicates that there is really not much difference between Canadians and Americans when it comes to their basic values. On major social issues such as responsibility for the poor and the elderly, marijuana laws and concerns about powers assumed by authorities to combat terror, there was less than 10 per cent difference between the views of Canadians and Americans. Curiously, Americans emerged more accepting of multicultural differences than their northern neighbours who pride themselves on their tolerance.
[emphasis mine: M.]
What can I add? About two weeks ago the same newspaper published a few articles on the same day about the desperate situation on the cross-cultural front. Despite the growing number of refugees arriving from war-zones we don’t have properly trained health care workers. There is only one (1) psychiatric nurse to deal with them - so says the newspaper. Not to mention the other service providers… I went to the settlement organization that was complaining about all these in the paper and offered to volunteer for them. To organize and put together training, seminars etc. We agreed I would call back to set an appointment. I’ve called three times, left messages - nobody ever bothered to call me back.
June 28th, 2005 at 23:06 (CDT)
They’re hypocritic, socialist jerks. Mostly. Now here’s the multilingual part: a szocialista embertipus az osszes lustasagaval, kisszerusegevel es egyalatalan osszes alantassagaval - nem halt ki. Mind itt vannak Kanadaban. I don’t know how would you translate it .. a socialist race..? Volt alkalmam as usaban dolgozni egy par evig. Valojaban most jottem vissza. Kanadai-amerikai vegyes csapattal dolgoztam: a “nem jerk” munkatarsaim voltak az amerikaiak. People try to go ahead, advance to survive in this daily rat-race. The americans pretty much understood that - everybody is equal for the same reason in the same sence. They talked openly, their reactions were human as you would expect. The Canadians never did that. It always felt like they’re having some kind of background agenda for everybody else.. Multiculturalism? You work with them - they accept you. This is how it works in the US. It is a centrally enforced government propaganda in Canada. They spend billions enforcing and overadministrating it with no result.. Actually there is a result but it is quite an opposite. Most Canadians have pretty racist tone with immigrants. Well I don’t want to blurb about it too much.. The programs of any governmental body in Canada mean only one thing: the endless flow of money into bureaucratic monstrosities which administrate themselves to death and do nothing else. How succesfully one program measures - means how greatfully they administrate it. Period. That’s why they don’t need professionals on any field in this country. Everything is about bureaucracy and not about the work of professionals. I think this is also a reason why their health care fails now.. Just put Kaffka’s Castle to an Orwellian environment and you’ll get Canada.
1984.. EH?
August 4th, 2005 at 18:51 (CDT)
As a one time resident of Toronto in the early seventies, I was amazed to find that it far exceeded the US in almost every area of socioeconomic conditions. The idea that the US is superior to Canada, or for that matter any other country in the area of the cross culture experience is simply not true.
What a society professes to practice and what it actually does are two different things. I don’t like to say it, but Americans, and especially the American Government like to make claims that are not backed in fact.
Elmo Jackson
August 22nd, 2005 at 14:08 (CDT)
You are probably a ‘baby-boomer’ then. You guys are lucky sobs.. Took everything for granted.. No pain - only gain. I envy you. No offence. Anyway, you compare Toronto’s social heaven of the seventies with American Government claims from … today I guess. What governments claim is one side of the coin. The real practice by its citizens is the other. The Canadian government has far more unreal claims than any government, I assure you.. I don’t want to go into a Canadian-US flaming war, it was done before.. it is still on.. you can find it all over on the Internet. I am a third party observer who had a chance to live in both realities. What I say is that the overall picture is brighter on the south side. Their everyday policies - the practice as how they live their everyday life and how they make space for others - are much more human.. This is my own experience of course, so it is pretty much subjective. Many may share my points, some may not..
Just one more: there has been changes in Canada since the seventies I am not sure you’re aware of. Toronto became a place where people ususally don’t want to grow a family..some compares it with the Chicago of the fifties which also can be an exaggeration. What I found very interesting is that many Canadians who were born and raised in Canada have similar opinions to mine about their system and about their country. Here’s a link for a start, you’ll find others to follow from there..
the Western Standard
1984.. EH?
August 24th, 2005 at 17:35 (CDT)
By the way: great comments on the following - The Conservative Moment article in Western Standard. I can’t believe I am not the one saying those…
I won’t post more reference to WP here..
November 23rd, 2006 at 22:29 (CST)
[...] Finally, somebody woke up in Winnipeg and realized the necessity to deal with the many issues related to immigrants and refugees and their settlement in a totally new world, new culture. More than a year ago, in May 2005, I wrote about the lacking willingness to address these problems. [...]